Lucian Grainge Took Home $39.6M Last Year. Why Do Songwriters Still Get Nothing from UMG’s Recorded Music?

Universal Music Group CEO Lucian Grainge once again topped Billboard’s list of highest-paid music executives, taking home $39.6 million in 2024.

And that’s considered a low year for him, according to them.

• In 2021, Grainge’s earnings skyrocketed to $303.6 million, thanks to bonuses from UMG’s former parent company Vivendi.

• In 2022, he made $49.7 million.

• In 2023, he pocketed another $150.3 million, including a $100M “transition award.”

• In 2024, his $39.6M payout once again made him the highest-paid executive in the music industry.

 

In just four years, Grainge has taken home more than half a billion dollars. Meanwhile, songwriters remain locked out of recorded music revenue even though there are no recordings without the songs they write. How does this make sense?

 

Labels insist songwriter pay should come only from publishing royalties. But publishing is a fraction of the business, and they know it. In 2024, UMG made $9.6 billion from recorded music while its publishing division brought in just $2.3 billion. The result: 75% of UMG’s revenue came from recordings, yet songwriters see none of it. Why?

 

Consider this: in 2024, Grainge alone received $19.9 million in stock awards. That same amount could have covered nearly 200,000 songwriter per diems at $101 each, the rate UMG already agreed to in the UK. Or it could have funded almost 4,000 songwriters with $5,000 song fees for the first use of their songs. Instead, all of it went to one man.

 

Now UMG has filed for a U.S. stock listing, valued at nearly $58 billion as of its most recent close in Amsterdam. The company hasn’t disclosed how much it plans to raise, but the message is clear: UMG wants Wall Street to buy into its growth story.

 

So here’s the question: If UMG can afford to pay Lucian Grainge more than half a billion dollars in four years, why can’t it afford to pay songwriters anything from recorded music?